


His Grave

by Freedoms_Champion



Category: The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Angst, Harry's not here he's dead, M/M, Pre-Book 13: Ghost Story, Sad, Spoilers, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:27:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27236485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freedoms_Champion/pseuds/Freedoms_Champion
Summary: Three months after the events of Changes, John goes to Harry's grave to reflect on how he got here and look for closure.
Relationships: Harry Dresden/Johnny Marcone
Comments: 11
Kudos: 25





	His Grave

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I apologize deeply for punching you in the feels. This one didn't want to leave me alone until I inflicted it on everyone else.
> 
> Please enjoy, even though it's sad! Comments are welcome.
> 
> Have a fantastic day!

A breath of freezing air whispered past my face as I stepped through the gates of Graceland Cemetery. Shivers went down my spine that had nothing to do with the temperature. I didn’t have much talent for magic, naturally speaking, but I was learning, and my senses told me I had stepped into a place of the dead. No doubt a stronger practitioner could have sensed the restless shades in Chicago’s largest cemetery. My lips twisted bitterly as I considered that some of them must have personal vendettas against me.

I’ve killed a lot of people.

Snow crunched under my feet as I walked, my movements providing the only sound in the area. Chicago hummed in the background, but there was no one else visiting the dead today. I hunched my shoulders against the cold and wondered if that made it easier or not. Under usual circumstances, I welcomed privacy. The fewer people who knew where I went and what I did, the better.

But my heart was heavy as I walked. It might have been comforting to see a living person here for the same reason that I was, to see proof that I wasn’t the only one suffering loss and that it was possible to live past the pain of it.

Some of the monuments I passed were huge, elaborate, and expensive. None of them caught my attention. The grave I wanted to see was a simple one. Just a white marble headstone, the grave still gaping open in defiance of regulations.

I paused to the side of the open grave and read the words. _Here lies Harry Dresden. He died doing the right thing._ A five-pointed star encased in a circle rested between the two sentences, inlaid with gold that looked tarnished and dull on this overcast day.

Harry Dresden wasn’t in his grave, of course. Contrary as always, even in death, he hadn’t left us a body to bury. None of his friends would ever guess that I regretted it as strongly as they did. I lay a long-stemmed red rose at the base of the headstone and bowed my head.

The wizard and I had never been what the casual observer would call friends. He hated everything to do with me and made no secret of it. Practically everything he’d ever said to me had been mocking and sarcastic, apart from a handful of genuine moments. His friends made it clear that they only worked with me because they didn’t have a choice, the same way he had.

I’d found him difficult and exasperating, to the point of nearly losing my professional manners at times. Behind it all, underneath the barbs and sneers, I respected him.

I’d seen into his soul the first time we met. It wasn’t exaggeration or something I could claim to do regularly. Wizards had a power to gaze upon the soul of anyone they made eye contact with and when they did, the other person could gaze back. I’d tricked him into soulgazing me.

His soul was like nothing I’d ever seen. From that moment forth, I had an unforgettable knowledge of the man, something few other people in the city could claim. Even wizards didn’t go around looking at human souls without consideration.

The darkness inside him had been drowning him slowly since that day. I’d watched him fight it, pull his head above the surface year after year, no matter how likely it seemed that he would fail. Now, his fight was over. The blazing life that had cast his shadow over the city and protected it was snuffed, leaving behind the rest of us to carry on his work as best we could.

I balled my hands into fists in my coat pockets and willed myself to remain stoic. I hardly shed tears these days. Weeping over mistakes did nothing to repair them or to bring life to the people who should still have it. I’d cried enough over Harry already.

The moment I’d found out he was gone was still fresh in my mind. Unsettled from nightmares, I’d been sorting through reports from my troubleshooters that outsiders were sniffing the edges of my territory when one of the detectives on my payroll had forwarded an internal file. There had been a shooting, blood at the scene but no body. The supposed victim, a friend of the man who owned the boat, was Harry Dresden.

All my blood turned to ice in a split second. Underneath a mental scream of denial, panic seized me. Without Harry to chase away supernatural predators, Chicago was in danger. I wasn’t ready to be without him. My status in the supernatural world hadn’t grown nearly enough.

Another brush of icy wind chilled the teardrops on my chin. I blinked more of them away and forced myself to stare at the headstone. Today, close to three months later, I had made my peace with things. It was time to close the door on the last of my lingering regrets and return my focus to the future.

I could let my secrets die with Harry. Persephone, still under my care. He’d known about her and said nothing. My gratitude could lie quiet with his headstone, along with the quiet thanks I could never give him. I owed him thanks for so many things, among them my life and title. Without him, I would be dead. The Accords would still be waiting for a mortal to sign them and Chicago would have no one to protect her.

My love for him could lie here, even if his body couldn’t. And I had loved him. His friends would never know it, couldn’t understand even if they did know. Some of them, in particular, I knew would have to be kept in the dark. The women who had loved Harry would hardly welcome me into their ranks.

In a way, I had been lost from the moment I looked into his eyes and soul. That was when my respect for him had been founded and affection followed soon after. Not that I could ever have told him. For all his knowledge and perceptive wisdom, Harry had been incredibly oblivious when it came to telling when someone liked him. Hiding it had been easy when he spent all of his time insulting me.

He would never know now how much time and effort I had spent to know what he was doing. All the hours I stayed awake and worried when I knew he was on a case that had the potential to kill him. There had been one every year, it seemed. By all rights, my hair should have been fully grey by now.

He might have saved me, but I had done the same for him. Once, without him even asking me. Miss Gard had told me there would be consequences for saving him in that alley. I’d been willing to accept them, never suspecting they would come in the form of genocide, global upheaval, and more deaths than I had ever seen.

“Could I have changed what happened?” I murmured, hardly aware of the words escaping me. “If I had gone with you, would you be alive now?”

His death could only be retaliation for what he had done. Even my people couldn’t learn much about the assassin who had killed him. The bare handful of information I’d gathered only told me the killer had known how to deal with a wizard. If I’d been involved, maybe I could have stopped it. I might have been able to bring him home with me, rather than letting him stay on his brother’s boat.

A few more bitter tears escaped and fell. If I had told him I loved him years ago, so many things would be different.

Or maybe they wouldn’t. He would never have loved me back. The words between us would have kept him from coming to me for help when his daughter was taken and without my help, he might not have found her in time.

Harry Dresden would still be dead, just messily dead and with a body for us to bury.

I swallowed the last of the tears and brought myself back under control. Nothing I could do would change what had happened. The only power in my hands was to protect the city Harry had spent his life defending.

The man I loved was gone, never knowing how much I cared for him. Before I let my love lie in his grave where he should be, I could use it to give me strength to honor his life and legacy.

I straightened my spine and turned away. There was work to do.


End file.
